


Planetarium

by lilith_morgana



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Gen, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-15
Updated: 2015-07-15
Packaged: 2018-04-09 11:40:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4347230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilith_morgana/pseuds/lilith_morgana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thom Rainier's life has always been about the women.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Planetarium

  
  
**Flora  
**  
  
She's never been kissed before, never been _touched_ by anyone besides her sisters and awful cousin Hoel who likes to pull her hair and demand a kiss on the cheek. She's never been kissed, not unless you count her own mouth, practising along her arm and the back of her hand. These are not things she tells _him_ , here down by the water where they have hidden in between the trees and bushes.   
  
It's a warm day, the height of summer and Flora kisses Thomas like she's done it a thousand times, over and over, all her _life_. He tastes of salt water and ham, smells of wood and sweat after working with his father; she closes her eyes when he's kissing her neck, closes her eyes and pretends he's a storybook knight or adventurer or the miller's oldest son. She wonders if he sees someone else, too, or if it's enough for him to feel her body under his hands.   
  
They're really big, those hands. Big and soft and hard at the same time as he presses her up against himself, breath catching in his throat when she does the same. _Hard_ and her head spins a bit. Her sisters talk about these things – at times it seems they rarely talk about anything _else_ – so Flora is quite certain how it's going to be, how it will unfold.   
  
She's lowering herself down onto the ground – it's a bit chilly despite the heat; she wishes for warmth, always warmth, _you're like a bloody snake_ her mother says in her head – and Thomas's gaze lingers on her for a moment before he follows suit.   
  
His hands again, under her skirt and between her legs, his fingers tugging and searching. Flora winces and squeezes her legs tighter around him, which he only takes as encouragement to continue.   
  
It hurts when he enters, hurts when he moves as clumsily and carelessly as he had touched her before but she clenches her teeth around the pain, remembers her sisters and their endless talk. Perhaps, she thinks, this is how it is supposed to be.   
  
Afterwards there is blood smeared on the inner of her thighs, on his cock when he looks down and then back up at her, frowning now.   
  
“You're bleeding.”   
  
He sounds _angry_ , as if she's willed her own body to bleed. Flora half-regrets the idea all of a sudden, regrets going with him from the marketplace, regrets telling him stupid lines her sisters have taught her, regrets lying about such idiotic things. _It's power,_ Mira claims in her head, _power at your fingertips._ Doesn't much feel like it but there's knowledge now, knowledge written on flesh and bones and she's relieved. The rumours about her, floating around the narrow little streets here for years and there haven't been any truth to them until now.   
  
“It's nothing.”  
  
Flora begins to clean herself, chewing on her lower lip. When Thomas looks her in the eyes again he doesn't appear to be as irritated as she would have thought – there's a flash of something else there, pity perhaps. It hits her like a blow; she doesn't want his bloody _pity_.   
  
“Why do you go around lying about these things for?”  
  
She shrugs, has no desire to talk. She never wanted him for _that_.   
  
“You didn't exactly ask.”  
  
He pulls the tunic over his head, drags it down over his chest with force. “People say you-”   
  
His voice drops before he cuts himself off.   
  
“People say your father has more bastards than he has coin.” It's a terrible thing to say, she can hear the weight of the words when they spill out but she refuses to look away, stares right into his narrowing eyes. “People are idiots.”  
  
For a while neither of them speak. Her skirts are damp and stained from being on the ground – being with _him_ on the ground – and there's a tiny stitch of pain inside when she crawls to her feet again. Nothing bad, though. She doesn't feel bad at all, a song of relief spreading inside.   
  
“I can walk you home,” he mutters and Flora smiles a little, shaking her head.  
  
“No need.”  
  
She likes to think he watches her leave, that is how she will remember this when she thinks of her first time.   
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
  
**Rosie**  
  
  
She knows she hasn't got much time.   
  
Hardly _any_ time now, it's running out fast between the fingers she can't seem to keep from her belly that swells, little more each morning when she looks at herself. It's not an unpleasant thing, not truly. It's just that she had hoped, against hope and all better judgement, that she wouldn't be having a bastard like her mother and her mother before her. _B_ _loody fine family tradition, eh?_ Her mother's voice is harsh, even in Rosie's head. A life of hard-earned coin and sharp tongues everywhere you go will do that.   
Rosie had planned it differently.   
  
But the Maker seems to care fuck all for her plans and the merchant had such wonderful, _mesmerising_ tales of the Orlesian Empire to trade for her attention and kisses. It's not an evening she regrets. All things considered.   
  
Ever since the monthly bleeding stopped her body has been morphing, gradually, into something she can't quite recognise. It's not just that it's growing, it's _developing_ in ways she hadn't known. There are days when she can't imagine wanting a man to touch her ever again, days when she feels like she's dying from exhaustion and this strange, slow business of the corners of her mind caving in on themselves, like she's going mad, days when she's nothing but open, ready, aching for someone – anyone – and rocks against the back of her own hand with teeth pressed so hard together she comes undone with a headache.   
  
It had been easy to catch his attention. She's always been a good-looking girl and these days her body is bursting at the seams, causing men to look after her everywhere she goes.   
  
Thomas Rainier had looked at her longer than anyone else and _grinned_ , paid for her ale and leaned in to whisper into her ear.   
  
_You're the prettiest lass in here._  
  
The Rainiers have been cursed with misfortune ever since their youngest died several years ago, everyone knows that, but Thomas isn't like his father. More passion, less wine. Under the circumstances he'll suffice, she decides again now when he's thrusting into her, a little deeper with every push. They'll sort it out.   
  
If there's truth to what they say about him he won't be careful enough, won't be thinking about the precautions and details of their coupling and this, Rosie thinks when she feels his rhythm quicken, his breathing laboured, this is a good thing. They're close now, both of them and her hands urge him on, nails digging into the broad planes of his back and arse. He's kissing her neck, she's running her fingers through his thick hair and it's good, it's _good_ -  
  
And then, to her surprise, he pulls out of her with a groan and she almost screams in frustration.   
  
“Maker's _balls_ ,” she hisses, it just slips out and Thomas looks at her, one eyebrow raised.   
  
She tries to smile it away but it's there now, like his seed all over her belly.   
  
As he gets dressed he gives her a long glance again, like he's going over something in his head; Rosie pulls the sheets up, pretending to wipe herself dry.  
  
He says nothing more, says nothing as he leaves.   
  
Two days later she watches him win the grand melee and afterwards she can't even catch a glimpse of him in the midst of the massive crowd that's gathered.   
  
They say he leaves Markham after that, six months before Rosie's first bastard is born.   
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
**Jays**  
  
  
The tavern outside Ostwick is crowded tonight.   
  
The familiar heat of people, wine and burning fires greet her as she opens the door and remains in the background for a long while. It's all about observing, for just the right amount of time: to quit before you've caught someone's attention, to keep at it long enough to have a fair reading of the room.   
  
She's good at it, has learned her craft well.  
  
A bunch of soldiers by the window - a tight group, impenetrable, too risky. A lone bearded man next to the bard – he's old, she could outrun him without effort but he looks poor, as downtrodden as the men in the corner to her left. Behind them two women sharing a bottle of wine – she doesn't steal from women, not unless times are truly desperate.   
  
Her eyes fall on the young man seated right at the heart of the tavern instead: big, loud, perpetually on the verge of being told off by the serving girls. He's boasting about something, she can tell by the way his arms and hands move through the air, the way he looks around as if to check that his story was heard. If she engages him in some sort of conversation she's doing everyone a favour.   
  
“I asked for a pretty girl.” He raises his hand to wave at the man currently seeing to ale and wine being distributed to the tables. “This one won't do.”  
  
The serving girl before him lowers her gaze. She's a skinny, mousy little thing who seems out of place, ill-suited for cocky bastards and roaring crowds.   
  
Jays shakes her head.  
  
“Am I pretty enough?” She walks up to him, hands on her hips. It's a good position for her, she knows her body's advantages and disadvantages well by now. Not so young any more but clever enough to make up for it, though of course there is no denying the power of a body that's still hard and sharp and bouncy in the right places. With a little shrug she juts out her hips, knows men find them distracting even if they're no longer narrow.   
  
The lad scrutinises her for a moment, a cheeky grin spreading across his features. He's not bad-looking, even if he's barely more than a boy. An arrogant little shit, at that; she hopes life will grind hard against those edges, make a decent man out of him.   
  
“You'll do.”   
  
Jays doesn't bother keeping the sarcasm out of her voice. “What an honour.”  
  
Later he's snoring, sprawled on a narrow bed with no care in the world and she thinks _too easy_ as she leans down on the floor to grab what coin she can find in his clothes and pack. He keeps too much of it around, it takes almost no skill and effort to grab it and run. It's almost indecent. _Almost_.   
  
“Sleep tight, sorry bastard,” she mumbles by the door.   
  
The following year, as she manages to turn up with enough coin in her hands to buy the ramshackle cottage she's been borrowing from no one, a stray thought goes to the annoying young man in a warm, crowded tavern outside Ostwick.   
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
**Hylde**  
  
  
The stupid sod's gone and brought her flowers again. She can see the lilies from where she stands with the other tavern girls, _waiting_.

They're always waiting. For one thing or the other: for men to demand them, for the night to end, for life to change. In that way, Hylde thinks, they're quite like the soldiers that come and go, seeking comforts in the wine and the women.   
  
This Thom is new to the life he leads, it's written all over his handsome face. He doesn't know anything about being a soldier or a man grown, that's why he brings her flowers like a suitor and that playful smile whenever she sits in his lap after having served him more wine.   
  
He always comes with her upstairs by the end of the night, always pays good coin for it, too, but there's a look in his eyes sometimes, telling her he thinks he shouldn't have to pay. That it's something _else_ between them.   
  
_Men never change, love,_ the older women say and roll their eyes.   
  
But Thom has soft lips and warm hands and a low, wicked laughter that coils and twists among the echoes of other nights, other men. Perhaps they are different; she can't claim to know a lot about these things. It's not what she's been taught.   
  
Perhaps they are not entirely about how he smells of horses and leather when she runs her tongue over the back of his neck, rakes her hands through the thick hair on his chest; horses and leather and sweat if he's been training with the other soldiers - _bloody idiots all of them_ and he kisses her hard then, hard and urgent.   
  
Tonight he's sweeter, a shade of softness in his movements and his arms around her. Hylde finds it harder to understand sweet, never knows what to expect beyond the kisses and those sodding flowers that stand in a goblet on the table now, watching them.   
  
Tonight he's greedier than she's ever known, as if he's searching for things in her she has never promised him. They're on the bed, intertwined, pressing against each other, against the night, against everything. The tip of Thom's nose rubs gently across the bridge of hers.  
  
“Don't you dare put a baby in my belly, soldier.” Her tone is light but it's only half a joke; he laughs all the same.   
  
“Well, then I'd have to marry you, eh?”   
  
She shakes her head. Stupid sod with his stupid words, too big for him.   
  
“You wouldn't marry me any more than you'd marry a horse.”  
  
He laughs into her hair, hands sprawled around her arse. Within seconds she's in his lap, the way he wants her. She remembers. She makes a point of always remembering.   
  
“I quite like horses, my lady.”  
  
There's forgetfulness in those words, stupid silly words that don't suit them; there's power in his gaze and how it swallows her, how it _grows_.   
  
  
  
*  
  
  
Winter's come and put a skin of ice around everything and Thom hasn't been visiting for weeks when Hylde takes a first sip of the tea she's been ordered to drink, three time a day until the bleeding begins.  
  
And if it doesn't? She had asked the woman by the mill, old Soina.   
  
_Then you pray to the Maker, lass._  
  
Hylda curses as she drinks her tea and each curse is a variation of his name.   
  
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
  
**Reinette**  
  
  
The markings and badges on his military wear tells her he's rising in the ranks, though she cannot discern them or remember their titles. They all blur to her, makes no difference. Just bodies to sustain the chevaliers and the empire, meaningless bodies willing to live and die for someone else. Most of them aren't, of course, not when it comes down to it.   
  
When it comes down to it most soldiers are just like the one before her – led astray by the flimsiest of temptation, any scrap of coin or attention. Simple, common creatures. She supposes the world needs them, supposes they have a purpose somewhere. Somehow.   
  
“You _reek_ ,” she says, allowing her gaze to travel over his stern face and wide shoulders. He's tall and large, made up of hard muscle and coarse hair. He really does smell like horses and steel, the stench of battlefields. It happens that her husband returns smelling the same.   
  
“And you stink,” the soldier returns, face half-buried in her oil-scented chest. Her husband never says _that_.   
  
The soldier keeps sucking at her skin in places where it will leave marks, he's rough with hands and lips and teeth. She makes a point of speaking Orlesian – fast, at that, speeches littered with archaic words her grandmother would use – to spite him as he spreads her legs and presses up against her. Already hard. Always such a crude and ready little shit.   
  
_Fuck me, you dirty little mongrel._  
  
It thrills her, she can't deny it, he can feel it through the silk between her legs and makes a low grunt which in turn, causes her to yank his hair harder; his skull burns beneath her fingertips, her nail leaving trails all the way down to his neck and throat but it's no matter, he's got no one to hide it from.   
  
“On your knees, soldier.”  
  
Reinette's husband is widely known for being almost impossibly handsome. Tall and lean, his face impeccably sculpted even with the addition of more recent scars and marking. Maker knows he looks even better with them, gives him more of a past, a history that you can pretend is exciting even if his isn't.  
  
And Reinette who's squirming under him, back and forth, unable to reach that height she so easily finds elsewhere, with others. The girl – elf, short cropped hair and a neck that tastes of berries and sweat in a fantastic combination - who's running quiet and afraid through the halls here. The stable boy with his stupid stutter at the smallest glimpse of her breasts and his overly eager hands, all over her back and hips, inefficient yet somehow remarkably enough. The blacksmith who makes her husband's armour and fucks her beneath his little shop – he's fat, almost too fat to fuck her in the first place, and leaves black fingerprints on her skirts. She looks at them later, in her chambers, looks at them for a long time before she sends the clothes to the servants for washing.   
  
And this soldier, this _nobody_ with his mouth buried in her cunt.   
  
I taught him to do that, she thinks and there's a rush down her spine at that sense of power, of _transformation_ , scant as it is.   
  
They never talk much.   
  
  
  
*  
  
  
  
Once he catches her unaware and the world crumbles around them.   
  
Unaware and her face is bare, her cheeks wet. She will not remember later why she was crying – a life is full of sorrows and thorns, she refuses to memorize them all– or what she said.   
  
She will only remember how he had crossed the floor with his arms across his chest and how his face had been unreadable, completely closed. _Checkmate. The queen is surrounded._  
  
She had expected laughter, a shove up the wall. Had he been a player rather than a survivor of the Game he would have had her cornered now, would have basked in his triumph.   
  
“Always knew you'd be beautiful under that mask,” he says instead and Reinette feels the words in her entire body. Feels the shape of a goblet between her hands a moments later as he holds it out for her, pouring wine from the bottle on her bedside table.   
  
Captain, she has learned recently. Captain Thomas Rainier.   
  
Many years later she vouches – to no avail - for his honour even when there's none to be found.   
  
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
  
**Everill**  
  
  
Birds of a feather, they say about them. Marchers, both of them, good swordsmen doing good work, bit of an attitude, bit of a _bastard,_ but decent people. She had been told about him her first day of training as a recruit. He had already advanced then, overcome those _problems_ _with_ _authority_ they accuse her of having, made a good story.   
  
Birds of a feather, they say about them and mean the accents – hers is less pronounced - and the commoner roots because they can't see that they also have the same knot of darkness buried deep. They can't see how deep the bonds go, how entwined it makes them. Everill isn't even certain Thom himself can.   
  
When she's rising in the ranks he buys a new sword for her. When he's got a few days off she drags him with her deep into the heart of every tavern they can find and makes sure neither of them remain sober for long.   
  
And then Maker help her, she watches him put his arms around some serving wench and laugh low and dark, a laugh that seems reserved for the women he wants to fuck.   
  
She orders more to drink then, swallows in greedy, quick gulps.   
  
Everill knows _better_. It doesn't help.   
  
It's not even as though he has a particular type, a refined taste with well-defined borders around. No, Rainier seems to go for everyone – though he does like them voluptuous and bloody cheerful, no doubt about that – with a handful of exceptions. Everill lacks both the bouncing tits and the loud laughter, she's always been a lanky grump; Rainier places his hand on her back like she's one of the lads and Everill swallows the pathetic indignation and orders another round for the lot.   
  
He's hardly the kind of man one falls in love with and he is aware, she can tell; at times she wonders if that's why he's so sodding obsessed with bedding women. To prove a point or run from a truth. It's like watching someone eat too much or drink too much – after a while it ceases to appear deliciously indulgent and just becomes sad, _desperate_ , an attempt to fix some unknown wrong.   
  
She can't stand to think of him like that.   
  
Rainier is tales by the fire and inappropriate jokes – often at his own expense, he's generous and not half as proud as a lot of men in his position. He's wine and ale and freshly hunted boars and fish, he can even cook them if he has too. _Learned it when I was a boy_ , he tells her when she asks.   
  
He is crude-mouthed tutoring and unexpected kindnesses, a whole body full of them. Sneers and under-his-breath remarks about the fancy nobles in the cities they visit together, short letters from whatever _Maker-forsaken pisshole_ he's stuck in for any longer period of time.   
  
He's an endless string of women that, half of the time, she has no idea how he even _finds_.   
  
Now he's becoming too old for it, she read exhaustion in the lines of his face. Her men tells her this all the time: got to settle somewhere, have a home, somewhere to retreat to but Rainier is like her, struggling out of his invisible chains.   
  
It's like a disease.   
  
  
  
*  
  
  
It's First Day and they spend it in a village outside Val Chevin.   
  
She's tired, restless, already drunk. Thom is saying something to the bard, leaning forward in that painfully familiar fashion, his eyes holding promises and exaggerations. _Prettiest girl in all of Orlais._   
  
“Heh.” He slams down another bottle of wine on the table upon his return to her. “Look at the girls here tonight, eh. Painted like nobility. Only thing missing is a mask.”  
  
Everill looks at the women he looks at, sees nothing extraordinary, merely women dressed up and painted as women.   
  
She shrugs. The exhaustion makes her voice thick. “Nobody wants to be invisible, Thom.”  
  
“Yeah?” And his _voice_ then, warped into a question like he's doubting her. Then he seems to catch himself and grins, flashing his teeth. “Tell you what, I'll get that dark-haired one into bed.”  
  
  
  
*  
  
  
It's Summerday, the last one he spends in Orlais.   
  
He doesn't smile that last time she sees him. His face is closed, his gaze shut tight, even his shoulders are framed differently, a hard slant to them. If he hadn't sought her, if he hadn't come to the tavern where she rents a room here in Val Royeaux, she wouldn't have dared addressing him at all. He looks like a man who want to be left alone.   
  
“Hey.” She stands in the middle of the room, thinking of safe distances and how she's always fucked those right up. _Dashing headlong into battle, Jaber. Someone's gonna knock that stupidity out of you soon enough._ It's fifteen years since they told her that now. “Rainier?”  
  
No answer. She lowers her voice, takes a step closer. She can see his hand curl around the goblet that stands on the table in front of him.   
  
“ _Thom_.”  
  
When he does look at her – finally, _finally_ – his eyes are black and bottomless, like something has broken, . Something has changed, she can't tell what. As she sits down beside him, his hands seek her arms, her face, one of his thumbs running along her chin. So many years and he's never touched her like this. Everill holds her breath.   
  
“Something happened,” he says but she can tell from his face that he's not going to reveal what.   
  
She's not going to ask. Perhaps she doesn't want to know.   
  
Perhaps she already knows.   
  
Back in her room later: his mouth on hers, her legs around his waist, his hands – hot, quick, hard – travelling to where she's ready, has always been bloody ready even if he's never seen it. Still doesn't, she knows this as he drags her down over him. Knows it when he fills her up, wordless and till, as though what they're doing breaks all vocabulary. It's not about that, not about her. It _is_ , all the same.   
  
“Something happened,” he says again when they're done – it doesn't take long, fuelled by need and hunger and a shivery kind of grief that she can't quite trace back to its roots.   
  
She watches his broad back as he gets dressed. There are scars there, intricate patterns of them and she's been there for almost every one.   
  
“Something bad?”  
  
He shakes his head, his voice like a broken whisper.  
  
“ _Terrible_.”   
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
  
**Jennet**  
  
  
She watches him from a safe distance for a long time that night, watches with a lump in her throat, a knife twisting and turning deep in her chest. _Go for the older ones and hope for the best_. Kiera's advice echoes. The young boys are the ones to watch out for, the young boys and their bodies full of life and strength and passion. _They get carried away, kid._   
  
This man isn't young, looks like someone who's led a different sort of life once. Some of the men frequenting this place haven't, have raised themselves on wine and women and anger. This one looks too alive for it still, even if he's worn and a bit fat now, the look of someone who seeks refugee in every tavern along the road to nowhere in particular. Someone on his way _down_ , even she can tell these things.   
Jennet's hands shake, so she keeps them tucked in at her sides, keeps her eyes fastened on the man's face. Everyone's got to make a living somehow.   
  
He's quite simple, at first. His hands come around her arse, his breath ghosts over the back of her neck.   
  
It's not a horrible kiss, as far as kissing goes. She closes her eyes around the way he looks, the way it happens, and thinks about the coin. He doesn't seem terribly excited by her attention – nothing like she's been taught, there's no urgency to it but perhaps it's not always that way.   
  
He's quite simple, at first, but then she speaks more than she should and he freezes, as though her voice is a poison or a curse.   
  
“Maker's _balls_ ,” he pushes her away from him, shoves her out of his lap. “How old are you, lass?”  
  
“Sixteen, serah.”   
  
She's told some men love that, has learned that a number of girls here lie about the numbers. This man winces and shakes his head, a flash of anger in his eyes though she doesn't feel like it's aimed at her.   
  
“You're not even a woman grown.” He stares into his drink. “What the fuck are you doing in a place like this?”  
  
The tone makes her scoff. “What the fuck do you think.”  
  
That silences him for a long while as he finishes his goblet of wine. She stands by his side, _stupidly_ , not knowing what to do next. Kiera never tells her about these men, those who refuse your service. He seems to understand that she isn't exactly keen on moving on to someone else in the too-hot room, that her feet seems to have grown accustomed to this spot, right here where it's confusing but simple. _Safe_.   
  
“Here,” he mutters later, as he makes to stand; his hand uncovers a small pile of coin.   
  
She begins to speak but before she's formed words he's pushed his way out of the place, out of sight.   
  
  
  
  


* * *

 

**  
  
Eira**

  
  
Sometimes she observes him with the Commander, walking side by side around the training grounds, deep in conversation or despair over the new recruits. They usually agree, speaking the same words in very different voices but with increasingly similar tones as the Inquisition grows and the threats spread with it, surrounding them. They're dedicated, hard-working, selfless. _Bloody gagging for it._  
  
They're _good_ men.   
  
Sometimes she observes him with the Commander and she knows, because Bull has told her with that amused glint in his eyes that appears whenever he talks about sex, that they both observe her in turn.   
  
“Ah, beware the desires of good men,” she tells him, inching closer until her shoulder is resting against his ridiculously wide chest. Her mouth makes it sound like a joke; it's a knowledge hammered into the bones of her chest, the fibres of her heart.   
  
“Wouldn't know anything about those, kadan.”   
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  
  
**Josephine**  
  
  
The flowers on her desk are dead despite fresh water and half a spoonful of sugar, like someone once taught her.  
  
Dead roses. Dead daffodils.   
  
He had lingered the last time he brought the flowers, had remained in her office though she suspects the guards must have given him reason to feel unwelcome there. Good thing Leliana is too busy with everything now that Corypheus is defeated, otherwise she would likely have ordered Blackwall's head on a pike for trespassing.   
  
Blackwall. Captain Thomas Rainier.   
  
Josephine's mother had known Lady Callier; she had attended the funeral feast in Orlais and spoke of it for a long time afterwards.   
  
When she had told Blackwall, his face had fallen a little bit further and it breaks her heart to think about it, about him, the endless ruin of his life like a long road still visible behind him now. Everyone has a past and she has been trained enough to let it go, to accept the unchangeable and make use of the present. But history echoes in us, in some more than others.   
  
He's a drawn-out memory made flesh.   
  
Then she had kissed him on the cheek, a brief kiss and a touch that had felt like fire.   
  
“Safe travels,” she had said and he had smiled – surprised, almost _shy_ which she can't quite believe now that she knows about the man he used to be.   
  
His lips against the back of her hand then. “My lady.”  
  
She wonders if he will survive the Joining; she wonders if she will mourn him if he doesn't.

 


End file.
